Kimihiro was getting better at this whole shopkeeper thing, he really was. As he learned more about the world (worlds, even) and the shop and himself (so little and yet so much about himself) he became better and better and granting wishes, naming prices.

Didn't mean he was perfect at it by any stretch.

Did this ever happen to Yuuko?

No, it can't have. She was better than this.

The gash on his face was nearly healed (no scars, never a scar, why aren't there scars) but today it was two broken fingers in the morning, and long, sharp cut high on his leg in the afternoon.

An all around fantastic day and Kimihiro was just thrilled that he bothered to wake up this morning. Morning? Yes, morning.

He didn't bother to call Doumeki for either. Stitched the cut up himself (poorly) and bandaged his fingers together with a splint from a first-aid kit Doumeki had left there. Of course Doumeki had left it there.

Kimihiro was sick of calling Doumeki for every damn injury. It was stupid, he was sick of it. Further and further and further in debt as this dumbass brought him food, brought him groceries, passed along news, and treated the wounds that Kimihiro may as well have given himself from his complete idiocy.

Yes, he knew he was the real idiot here, not Doumeki. No, Doumeki was still an idiot. A bastard, a jerk, a complete moron who spent his free time babying his weird friend who lives in a shop no one can see. Spent all his time taking care of Kimihiro.

Whatever, Doumeki was stupid about it and everything was wrong. Every time Doumeki was here Kimihiro was reminded of just how deeply wrong this whole thing was, because Doumeki was aware of just how deeply wrong it was and despite that blank-faced non-expression being the same, Doumeki was different. He didn't interact, didn't respond. Kimihiro would give up for days (days?) at a time then try, just try to get something from him. Make a food he liked but kept it on the opposite side of the table so he would have to reach over (Doumeki just asked). Blow smoke in his face (Doumeki just stared). Lay on the porch with his robe barely covering him and sleep there all night, not waking until the morning dew clung to the folds of his fabrics and made his glasses unusable (Doumeki just blinked).

Was there nothing of his old life that could stay the same? He was the one who would remain unchanged for the foreseeable future, so why was it everyone else who changed so quickly?

Had everyone changed? He'd… only seen Doumeki.

"Oi, Doumeki," he asked over a dinner of half-hearted yakisoba. Surely Doumeki couldn't tell the difference between the amount of effort that went into a dish if you used all the same ingredients, right? Besides, it tasted the same as all the other times he made yakisoba:

Unmemorable.

"What."

Just what. Not a question or anything, just what.

So Kimihiro just spit it out because why beat around the bush on this one.

"Where is everyone?"

Doumeki froze at that.

"Himawari-chan and Kohane-chan and Oba-chan and-" nope those are the only other people he knew that weren't spirits or traveling across worlds.

What really was the point of leaving the shop if no one knew him and he knew no one? Doumeki seemed upset over the decision, the price, everything, but Doumeki knew other people. He had a family, could surely make new friends. Went to school, had a life.

Or at least could have a life if he wanted to, but apparently it seemed the shop was becoming a priority in his life.

Kimihiro could never have that, and perhaps that's why Doumeki didn't understand.

"I haven't heard from them," Kimihiro finished, breaking off that train of thought. "It's been…"

Well now, he had no idea how long it had been, now did he?

"They're well," Doumeki said after a long, long moment.

Kimihiro frowned at Doumeki's two word reply. "Are they now?"

Doumeki nodded.

"I would have liked to hear that from them," Kimihiro explained because clearly Doumeki was not picking up on this. "Not you."

Doumeki set his bowl and chopsticks down and took a breath. "And when would you have liked that?"

Kimihiro blinked at the question. When? Immediately, that's when.

"Sooner than now."

Doumeki clenched his jaw and Kimihiro certainly didn't know what to think about that.

"Would they have come here? Or called?"

"I-"

What did Kimihiro expect to happen? Everyone would stop by for a little visit and he'd throw them a tea party?

"Yes," he decided. If they had called, Kimihiro would surely have picked up the phone.

Wouldn't sound like he'd just slept, was still sleeping, wanted to go back to sleep. Wouldn't let the alcohol slur his speech and jumble his words and thoughts.

If they had come to him, he surely would have welcomed them in.

Wouldn't lay back in immodest silks and pose provocatively. Wouldn't cloud the room with smoke from a pipe that wasn't his, would never be his.

Would he have? Had Kohane come to see him, would he have worn a proper outfit and put out the smoke? Had Himawari called, could he have held a conversation with her at all?

"Or…" Kimihiro backpedaled on what was such a resolute answer a moment ago. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, laying back on the floor. "Perhaps not."

But then who was Doumeki to keep them away? What gave him that sort of authority over his life? Why was Kimihiro stuck stuck stuck with Doumeki making these decisions for his life. Kimihiro was supposed to make these decisions.

Kimihiro couldn't make those decisions, not at first, couldn't make any decision, made the one and no others. Maybe Doumeki was right (he was never right, he was always right, he didn't understand, couldn't understand).

"I'd like to hear from them," he decided, then looked at the amount of untouched food in Doumeki's bowl. "If the food isn't up to your standards let's at least have a drink."

Kimihiro didn't want to think about this. Think about the lack of control he had over his own life. Just wanted that blank feeling of having no thoughts, no thoughts at all. A blank head, fuzzy, blurry, floating, safe.

It was… Thursday. Yes, definitely Thursday. So proclaimed his calendar, and thus he would stick with it. Why not Thursday? It could be Thursday.

It was a Thursday in… Well the calendar said August but if the leaves outside were any indication, maybe it was closer to September.

Well then, maybe it wasn't a Thursday.

At any rate it was morning.

Nope, sun on the wrong side.

At any rate it was afternoon. Kimihiro awoke in the afternoon of a maybe-Thursday in possibly September to the sound of the phone ringing.

He made his way to the phone, confused, for who would call him on this, a maybe-Thursday afternoon in possibly September?

"Hello?" he asked, unable to mask that sleepy quality of a voice that had gone unused for hours.

"Watanuki-kun!"

Immediately some emotion in him snapped at the sound and he let out a breath, smiling.

"Himawari-chan," he said softly. He hadn't heard from her since… "It's good to hear your voice."

She laughed lightly. "Yours too. Though you sound like you've been sleeping?"

"Ah, yes, just a quick… nap. I cleaned."

He cleaned? Really, that's how he wanted to start this conversation?

But he had cleaned. A deep clean in the kitchen, particularly. He needed a clear space, a blank space, a space he could control. Cleaning he could do, if nothing else.

"Ah, hard at work then," she said with an odd tone in her voice, though he could still hear her smile over the phone. God, he could almost see her smile just from her voice. "Doumeki-kun told me you were feeling better?"

Was he feeling better?

Well, he cooked dinner yesterday and was told it was very good so clearly he wasn't feeling worse. And he'd organized half a storeroom this week (it was as much as he could do; the reminders were too much and he spent the rest of the day with a bottle of who-knows-what but that was neither here nor there).

On the other hand, his finger was broken and Yuuko was gone and he didn't exist and-

Kimihiro took a breath. He didn't want to worry Himawari with these concerns.

"Yes," he told her (lied? No he was, no he wasn't, was he?)

Himawari let out a breath she had apparently been holding and Kimihiro felt a pang of guilt run through him.

"You had us all very worried, Watanuki-kun," she told him through a smile. She had such a nice smile, he would have liked to see it.

Kimihiro laughed half-heartedly. "I'm sorry to have worried you like that." That was true, that hadn't been true at the time, he hadn't thought about it, but it was true now.

"Mm," she agreed. "Just be sure to take care of yourself, okay?"

"I-"

He wanted to protest. To tell her he was taking care of himself and had been and always has been but he knew he hadn't been, wasn't, no longer-

"Of course," he agreed.

"…I'd love to come by the shop sometime," she requested then, and he could hear her smile falter for a moment. "But…"

Yes, he wanted to say. Please come I want to see you I miss you.

He was quiet for a long moment. Yes, he desperately wanted to see her, but…

But Yuuko had requested she stay away and he had to uphold what Yuuko said, he was the Shopkeeper now but she was the Shopkeeper before she knew better than Kimihiro did. It was obvious, the shop was dangerous for her and she was dangerous for the shop.

"I'm sorry, Himawari-chan. I… you can't."

It was her turn to be quiet for a long moment, an excruciatingly long moment wherein Kimihiro slumped down to the ground, sitting against the wall. The girls peeked their heads around a corner with a sad look on their faces.

"That's what I thought," Himawari said finally. "That's okay. I'll be sure to call often. Is that alright?"

Kimihiro nodded. "Yes, I love to hear from you, Himawari-chan. I… I'll see if I can… do something."

Do what? Do nothing, apparently.

"Mm."

"Ah, Himawari-chan," he said suddenly. "I… Don't buy lunch tomorrow," he told her.

Another paused. "Are you sure, Watanuki-kun? I heard… Doumeki-kun told me about…"

Gifts, that's right.

"It will be fine." He would make it fine. "Your call means a lot to me."

She giggled and Kimihiro smiled.

They talked for a short time, just about frivolous things. It was… nice.

At least until he felt that pressure in his head that could only mean someone had entered the shop.

"I have to go," Kimihiro told her. "I'm sorry, I- Please call again," he told her.

"Mm. I will!" she assured him brightly.

"Pi! Pi!"

"And Tanpopo too!"

Kimihiro smiled. "I look forward to it."

Kimihiro decided to do a bit of organizing. One of the storerooms was an absolute disaster This was Yuuko's doing, not his own, he knew. He hadn't bothered to organize or clean it because the mess was a reminder of her.

But he couldn't do that forever. He couldn't not clean her shop. She would have forced him to do it if he'd been here. To clean was the proper routine, so he fell back into it, imagining Yuuko there annoying him through the whole processes and requesting ridiculous foods all the while. It was a horribly depressing exercise, but the ache from it felt good. A good hurt. A hurt he wanted, needed? (didn't need didn't want, craved).

He felt someone enter the barrier to the shop and sighed. He had just figured out a system and he was still wearing his kappōgi and headscarf like some sort of part-timer.

Then he watched the girls run across the floor to greet whomever it was, so clearly it was Doumeki.

Kimihiro just rolled his eyes and got back to work. Hopefully he'd brought that miso he'd requested.

The steps that approached him in the storeroom were so soft though. Light and hesitant and not at all Doumeki. He turned, confused, and saw that it was Kohane who decided to visit.

"Kohane-chan," he said softly, still sitting on the floor and holding various bizarre and magical items to organize.

"Kimihiro-kun," she said, face serious and eyes wide.

Pitying, he thought at first, but on a second consideration he saw sympathy. For one so young she was very understanding. However, it was to be expected from her, she was so perceptive. Did he want a perceptive person right now? His practiced mask of indifference wasn't as practiced as he wished and it would never work on her in the first place.

"I was hoping to see you soon," Kimihiro told her. He put aside the items (carefully, carefully, these were Yuuko's not his) as she came closer.

"We were worried about you."

Kimihiro didn't know what to say about that. Was it worrisome? Retrospectively… God, he didn't want to admit it but it was, it had been, won't continue to be (will it? No, yes, he didn't know, had no control).

So again he apologized.

"I'm sorry, Kohane-chan. I'm doing better now" He gave her a tight smile, but she just put a hand on his cheek.

"Kimihiro-kun, you are very important to us."

He put his hand on her shoulder and felt as his smile softened, loosened. "And you are all very important to me."

She nodded and put her hand back down. "You should talk to us. When you're hurting."

Talk? He didn't want to talk, didn't want to explain what couldn't be understood. But here was Kohane, just a child (wouldn't be a child forever, would age past him so quickly, don't think about that, he couldn't not think about it, push it aside), and she wanted him to talk. Maybe she could understand. His choice, his payment.

"You are important to me too," he explained. "I know it looks like I…" But he trailed off. Couldn't figure out the words.

Kohane nodded. "You didn't leave us. I understand."

Of course she understood.

His chest, which had felt so tight, loosened and he felt like he could breathe, but it felt like too much breath, too loose, if he was too loose, lost control, his façade-

His eyes stung with unreleased tears. Ones he refused to release, and certainly not in front of Kohane. No, he would keep the smile, no tears, dry eyes, a happy face, he was happy to see her no need to cry simply because she understood.

But then why were his cheeks wet?

Why was he sitting here on the floor of a storeroom he'd never even found before, crying to a child?

Kohane stayed with him until sundown. Together they cooked the next day's lunch for her, Doumeki, and Himawari and packaged them up nicely. He had needed the help, with one hand down three fingers (two taped up and an unmoving pinky) and had apparently also needed the company. She was a quiet worker, but soft and understanding. She promised to come cook with him weekly. Fridays, she said.

Fridays could work for him. They were the same as any other day, may as well make them worth it.

Time went on and injuries were fewer and less and he was making food again and he had memorized the texture on the ceiling of the sitting room because he was awake more frequently and it's not like there was much else to look at while laying down, aside from smoke.

The smoke from Yuuko's pipe as it dissipated in the air and drifted away. The clouds hung heavy and he almost felt like he could touch them, but when he waved his hand through, the smoke just cleared. It wasn't really there.

He breathed in a lungful of it, and no, it was definitely there.

The patterns on the ceiling, however, they were definitely not there. Just a trick of that memorized texture, the light, his own poor vision, and the ever-changing haze.

It was nice to just look at the ceiling and see whatever he wanted to see. Like looking at clouds, but you didn't need to wait for the weather. It became a bit of a game, really. A mental exercise. What pattern do you see in the texture today, Kimihiro, and what could it mean, he would ask himself.

The smoke there looked like a cherry blossom and he wondered if Sakura was well.

Which inevitably (ha) led Kimihiro to wonder how Syaoran was doing, for he was paying a price of his own. To keep their existences, to escape from that void of space and time, to-

The wishes were many and the pricing was high. Syaoran couldn't stay still and Kimihiro had to stay put. Even his time was stopped.

All the better, for his wish to see Yuuko again.

Yuuko, Yuuko, it always came back to her. Nearly every memory in his life is invariably tied back to her, somehow. If not her, then a spirit he met through her, a customer of her shop. The only people who knew Kimihiro also knew Yuuko so clearly there was no Kimihiro without Yuuko, though there was a Yuuko without Kimihiro.

Twisty, twisty logic. Twisty and ephemeral, like the smoke from his pipe.

"Watanuki! Watanuki!"

Slowly, Kimihiro sat up, holding his—Yuuko's!—pipe to the side, and readied his reasoning to deny Mokona more alcohol for the day but Mokona was closer than he thought and instead jumped right into his face.

It seems boundaries were back down. Good to know he had to watch out for flying Mokonas again, he didn't miss that (god, he missed that).

"What." Kimihiro all but growled at the little bun, pulling him off his face with his free hand.

"Watanuki had a phone call!"

"Eh?"

The phone wasn't ringing or anything, and Kimihiro was certain he never had a cell phone.

"Your jokes aren't funny," Kimihiro sighed, tossing Mokona aside and laying back to continue in his…

Thinking, he supposed.

He brought the pipe back up to his lips when suddenly in front of him was Syaoran.

Well now, wasn't that just a coincidence.

Kimihiro sat up again, slowly and incredibly aware of just how little this robe covered. Ah well, no changing it now. He took one last breath from his pipe before settling it aside.

"I was just thinking about you," he told Syaoran with a tight smile.

Syaoran returned it with a wide one of his own. "Maybe because I was thinking of you."

"Mm," Kimihiro agreed. "What's the occasion?"

"What? No occasion! I just… wanted to check in."

"Ah, I guess it has been some time."

Syaoran shook his head. "No, it's been… a week maybe."

Well that didn't track.

"Syaoran, I'm certain it's been more than a week." Kimihiro knew that much, if very little else.

"H- how long has it been then?"

See, one of the many things Kimihiro didn't know.

"The seasons have changed… Months, I suppose," he decided, returning to his pipe if only for something to do with his hands.

"I don't…"

"Ah," Kimihiro finally understood. Idiot. What a terrible dimensional witch replacement he was turning out to be.

"What?"

"Our timelines aren't lined up," he explained, then shrugged. "It's bound to happen, when you're hopping from place to place like that.

Syaoran looked… panicked?

"I'm not going anywhere, you know," Kimihiro reminded him. "My time doesn't matter."

But that didn't seem to completely put Syaoran at ease, which meant…

"Ah, you're thinking of Sakura-chan."

Syaoran nodded and looked away.

"I see."

Kimihiro took another breath from the pipe, this one deep as he considered the conundrum.

Clearly Syaoran's travels would keep him outside the traditional timeline, that was just how it would be. A fact. A price, even.

But what did that mean for the people important to him? For Kimihiro, it apparently meant his time was going faster.

Imagine that. Maybe he would have Syaoran far longer than anyone else he knew.

For Sakura though… Ah, Yuuko would know the answer to this. The answer to everything. Kimihiro knew nothing, nothing compared to her.

But he was the Shopkeeper, a granter of wishes, a source of knowledge for others, just as Yuuko had been. Will be again, surely.

But until she came back, Kimihiro had to figure this out as well. Wish granting was one thing, but knowledge was another.

So Kimihiro blew out the breath he'd held, not wanting to keep Syaoran in another moment of distress because he knew the answer to this one, as he'd already been given the answer by Syaoran calling in the first place. Yes, this be knew. This one of nothing else, never anything else, she-

He could do this. He wouldn't have become Shopkeeper if he wasn't able to. Fate would have tended another way, right?

"Syaoran, you and Sakura-chan are connected. The bond between the two of you will keep you in line. Just as the bond between us keeps you with me longer, so does the bond between you and Sakura-chan," he assured Syaoran. How would she phrase it?

He didn't know. He only knew how he would say it.

"You two are inevitably intertwined, and no price can separate that. So don't worry."

Kimihiro gave him a tight, though sincere smile.

"I- thank you, Kimihiro."

"I don't really know these things though," Kimihiro admitted, just in case he was horribly incorrect, always incorrect. "Just what I feel."

"I trust you," Syaoran told him, so resolute that Kimihiro nearly believed it himself.

Should he be trusted with these things? Should anyone be trusting him as any sort of authority?

No, likely not. Not yet.

"Kimihro, are you alright?"

No.

"Of course."

"Please don't lie to me."

It seemed Kimihiro wasn't practiced enough to lie like that to someone so close. Someone whose existence he shared.

"I will be," he corrected. "In time." Which I have plenty of now. "That is how these things go. Wounds heal. I, we both will have that scar, Syaoran, I know this. You know this. We both…"

Syaoran nodded. He understood. He understood like no one else around him what this price was, what this price meant, how this price felt.

Not exactly, of course. For Kimihiro it felt like a weight. Like stagnation. Like despite the progress he's made, will make, has even made, he will never move

He's in the same spot

Some days he felt like he could float, far away, far away. In dreams he could. Never did, but he could. Sleeping was weightless. Light, airy.

Living was heavy. Being conscious.

Everything passing him by, passing him by, going over, around, under, never into, never through. Being held down by nothing.

How could something be so heavy but have no substance?

Syaoran on the other hand. Nothing held him down. His feet had no grip on the ground, space had no hold on his form, any place he stops will invariably spit him back out eventually. The same way that Kimihiro was tied down, Syaoran was floating away like a leaf on a breeze that will never let him down.

They both paid their prices. Syaoran could never stop and Kimihiro could never move. Opposite and equal. Sometimes Kimihiro wondered if he preferred their roles reversed.

No, then Kimihiro could never see Yuuko again. Kimihiro would never be safe again. In a world that worked so hard to be rid of him, always trying to get rid of him, misery to everyone around him, wipe him out this unnatural existence this-

Silence lingered for a moment, though not an awkward one, not one that needed filling with whatever chatter Kimihiro would have ruined it with previously. It was contemplative, understanding. Each knew the other's pain, the type of pain that words can't properly express. The poetry of heartbreak isn't written with words.

Kimihiro took another breath of smoke before speaking again. "Syaoran, I don't believe I've had a proper conversation with you," he realized.

Syaoran seemed flustered. "N- no, surely we've spoken!"

"If so, it's a memory I no longer retain."

Syaoran frowned, thinking. "I guess we haven't."

"Well then." Kimihiro sat up properly, put his chin on his hand, and smiled, ready to finally speak with someone else who understood, and someone he could understand. "Tell me about yourself."

A/N:

Well my my my it has been a while!

A few things:

1. I have Kimihiro referring to himself as Kimihiro in his internal narrative. If this is odd or jarring, let me know and I can have Watanuki be Watanuki.

2. I have at least one or two more chapters planned after this! I can't promise I'll go much longer than that though!

3. I hope this flowed well enough from the rest of it considering it's been 4.5 years since I've written for this!

4. As always, love it? hate it? just want to say hi? have a prompt or just want to meta? leave a comment, send a PM whatever!

5. Thanks for reading!